On a wild night in Las Vegas, with rain lashing down, it was Lando Norris who played the best hand, taking his seventh pole of the season, ahead of Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz. So what’s on the cards for race day, strategy-wise? Let’s take a look at the options…
What happened last year?
The pre-race sims suggested a medium>hard one-stop was the fastest way to the chequered flag – but very few attempted it. All 20 drivers had saved two sets of hard tyres for the race, and were determined to use them.
The first nine over the line all ran a medium>hard>hard race, with Sergio Pérez in P10 mixing things up with a hard>medium>hard, in a bid to offset his strategy, and make gains from P15 on the grid.